DICOMmunicator Help: Overview

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Introduction:

The Dicommunicator software package has been developed to facilitate transfer of Dicom images beyond the traditional limits of the PACS environment. Conventional PACS software is primarily designed to facilitate transfer of images for direct patient care applications within an institution or group of linked institutions. Frequently, however, there is a need to transfer images out of the direct patient care environment. Applications such as teaching file development, copying of Dicom images to CDROM or other transferable media, the capability of sending images as attachments to email messages, and the electronic submission of imaging data to cooperative research groups are examples of functions not typically supported by conventional PACS equipment.

Significant effort has been made to protect patient confidentiality. The default setting for all image transfers (image export, email, ftp, etc.) will protect patient confidentiality by “scrubbing” the patient’s name and ID from the Dicom image, replacing these fields with values specified by the user. Because some images (US images for example) have patient demographics embedded directly into the pixel data, a customizable facility is also included to allow “masking” of portions of the image that contain patient identifying information. These functions can be overridden if the user chooses to leave demographics unmodified. Automatic mapping of demographics form local institutional to research database values is also supported. Finally, encryption of Dicom image files attached to email messages is also supported.

Many of the functions performed by this package are extensions of tools actually written by commercial vendors. For example, the Email and FTP functions are achieved using ActiveX tools written my Mabry Software. The Dicom functionality also derives from a set of ActiveX tools. These tools are collectively included in the DicomObjects toolkit produced and sold by Medical Connections and a licensed copy of this software should be installed on each computer running Dicommunicator software. A free demo copy of DicomObjects and ordering information can be obtained from Medical Connections at http://www.medicalconnections.uk/.

This program was developed by Keith S. White, M.D., a pediatric radiologist at Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah. Comments regarding bugs or futures can be directed to him at pckwhite@ihc.com. The deployment package was developed in cooperation with the Quality Assurance Review Center. Questions regarding deployment, installation, etc. should be directed to Richard Hanusik at Rhanusik@qarc.org .